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The Allusionist

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A PODCAST ABOUT LANGUAGE
BY HELEN ZALTZMAN

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The Allusionist

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Allusionist 176 Fat part 1 transcript

May 12, 2023 The Allusionist

AUBREY GORDON: The words that always bothered me considerably more than ‘fat’ are the many, many, many euphemisms that people who aren't fat come up with to supplant fat. 
HZ: ‘Curvy’. My chins are.
AUBREY GORDON: Totally. I'm like, “I have one curve, guys! I'm just like an egg shape.”

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In transcript Tags etymology, words, language, society & culture, history, fat, fatness, anti-fat bias, anti-fatness, fatphobia, Aubrey Gordon, Maintenance Phase, bodies, body, overweight, bias, obese, obesity, WHO, World Health Organisation, chairs, medical, medicine, health, Donald Trump, figurant, portly, stocky, stout

Allusionist 175 Eurovision part 2 transcript

April 22, 2023 The Allusionist

DEAN VULETIC: There are lots of economic, cultural and political factors that can decide which language will be most represented in a country's entries, even when it has various national languages.
HZ: Azerbaijan: the only country never to have entered in its national language.
DEAN VULETIC: Correct.
HZ: Could be this year.
DEAN VULETIC: Errrr, I doubt it, because the Azerbaijani government has been very ambitious in Azerbaijan’s Eurovision entries, in using them as a tool of soft power and cultural diplomacy. It has spent a lot of money in getting well-known songwriters and composers from across Europe to produce pop hits that could really win Eurovision. And of course, this means hits in English. And once Azerbaijan did win Eurovision in 2011 and went on to host the most expensive Eurovision ever in Baku. So Eurovision is also popular among dictators as a tool of cultural diplomacy - or as a tool for whitewashing their human rights and democratic records.

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In transcript Tags words, language, society & culture, arts, history, Eurovisionallusionist, Dean Vuletic, singing, songs, tv, television, broadcasting, geography, politics, political, Eurovision Song Contest, European, Europe, pop, music, European Broadcasting Union, EBU, European Broadcasting Area, ESC, public broadcasters, controversy, governments, human rights, protests, national languages, dictators, dictatorships, Azerbaijan, English language, Belgium, Kosovo, Serbo-Croation, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovenian, Croatia, Yugoslavia, former Yugoslavia, Albania, Belarus, Balkans, Ukraine, Russia, Switzerland, Sweden, Armenia, Vladimir Putin, rules, technology, Mongolian, Crimea, Crimean Tatars, war, conflict, KGB, Italy, referendum, divorce, urinant

Allusionist 174 Eurovision part 1 transcript

April 7, 2023 The Allusionist

The Eurovision Song Contest has given us the international renown of Celine Dion, Måneskin, Dana International, Conchita Wurst and Riverdance; tear-off skirts, nul points, shiny shiny costumes, a band of babushke dancing around an onstage bread oven; not to mention fraught politics, within and between nations. And most importantly for our purposes: linguistic intrigue! So much linguistic intrigue.

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In transcript Tags etymology, words, language, society & culture, arts, history, Dean Vuletic, singing, songs, tv, television, broadcasting, geography, politics, political, Eurovision Song Contest, European, Europe, pop, music, ABBA, Waterloo, Volare, Italian, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, France, Spain, Spanish, Norway, Sweden, Malta, English, Italy, United Kingdom, UK, Welsh, Wales, Australia, Luxembourg, Belgium, Flemish, Walloon, Israel, Hebrew, Finland, Netherlands, European Broadcasting Union, EBU, European Broadcasting Area, ESC, public broadcasters, latitude, longitude, multilingual, polyglot, bloc voting, francophone, national languages, Breton, controversy, Domenico Modugno, 20th century, 1950s, radio, portmanteau, portmanteaux, Serge Gainsbourg, Marc Chagall, rules, constructed languages, conlang, soccer, technology, ruelle, Eurovisionallusionist

Allusionist 173 Death transcript

March 24, 2023 The Allusionist

EVIE KING: I mean, if I was to google synonyms of ‘dead’ - let's try that. Synonyms, ‘dead’. See what comes up. ‘Deceased.’

HZ: ‘Deceased’ is just Latin for death.

EVIE KING: ‘Late’, ‘lost’, ‘lamented’...

HZ: ‘Lamented’! 

EVIE KING: ‘Expired’ - expired! Like a cheese. ‘Departed’. ‘Gone’. ‘No more. ‘Fallen. ‘Slain’. Now you're starting to infer causes of death. ‘Slaughtered’, ‘killed’ - see, it escalates quickly. There’s not much, there's not much is there?

HZ: Which is odd considering how much death there is everywhere for everyone.

EVIE KING: Yeah, you get more, more synonyms for very boring words, don't you, very workaday words. I think basically maybe it comes down to the fact that dead is dead and we all know what that means, universally dead is dead, and there's no getting away from it, there's no escaping it and there's no getting around it. So we just have to face that word and use it. And if we don't feel like saying dead, we'll just go “passed away”. 

HZ: Maybe that's the thing: maybe we don't need new vocabulary yet until we've learnt to get comfortable with ‘dead’.

EVIE KING: And then we can start really jazzing it up. Creating fun terms! Like, you know, when you get things like ‘bottomless brunch’ - that kind of thing for ‘dead’. I think we all know we've arrived when we've got a jazzy snazzy word for ‘dead’. 

HZ: Something to look forward to.

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In episodes Tags etymology, Helen Zaltzman, words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, history, death, died, dead, grief, passed, bereavement, bereft, Cariad Lloyd, Evie King, funerals, posthumous, anticipatory grief, admin, paperwork, eulogy, platitudes, Sweden, Swedish, wills, bum-bailiff

Allusionist 172 A Brief History of Brazilian Portuguese transcript

March 9, 2023 The Allusionist

CAETANO GALINDO: Brazilians are very confused and confusing and confounding about this relationship with the Portuguese language, because it defines us. We are the place that speaks Portuguese in the middle of a whole bunch of Spanish-speaking countries, and pretty much all of us speak it. And pretty much all of us speak only this one language. It's really something that defines us, and really something that we cannot try to deny or erase or… I don't know. But at the same time, you have this certainty that this was an imposed reality, that this is not what we could have.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, history, telling other stories, Caetano Galindo, Brazil, Brasileiro, Brazilian, Portuguese, Portugal, Black history, slavery, enslaved African people, Transatlantic slave trade, slave owners, white supremacy, indigenous languages, línguas gerais, lingua franca, oppressed languages, South America, Latin, colonisation, Nheengatu, Caetano Veloso, ladino, locorestive

Allusionist 171 Supplantation transcript

February 24, 2023 The Allusionist

HZ: How do you feel when you have to tell someone your address?
LYLA WHEELER: I feel uncomfortable, like, why am I writing this? Why am I talking about this?
KRISTIN DALEY: I feel the same way. I'm mortified.

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In Telling Other Stories, transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, society & culture, history, telling other stories, renaming, problematic, racism, anti-Black racism, Canada, Canadian History, London, Ontario, eponyms, Ryerson, Egerton Ryerson, schools, campaigns, petition, American history, Black history, slavery, enslaved African people, Transatlantic slave trade, slave owners, white supremacy, Josiah Henson, plantation, plantations, roads, streets, street names, towns, Toronto, Toronto Metropolitan University, Dundas Street, Indigenous Canadians, residential schools, Jamaica, local government, council, policy, addresses, zonda

Allusionist 169 The Box transcript

January 28, 2023 The Allusionist

SUBHADRA DAS: A guy from the UCL estates team, screwdriver, took the plaque off the wall.
HZ: That's it?
SUBHADRA DAS: That's how you dename a building. It's not difficult.

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In Telling Other Stories, transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, telling other stories, renaming, names, eponyms, problematic, science eponyms, science, scientific, Subhadra Das, Martin Austwick, Trinity College Dublin, TCD, University College London, UCL, Dublin, London, university, college, buildings, honours, honors, eugenics, racism, Erwin Schrödinger, Karl Pearson, Francis Galton, Schrödinger’s cat, Schrödinger’s equation, theories, quantum mechanics, physics, genetics, moon, Nobel Prize, light, waves, quantum, quantum wave function, Louis de Broglie, Arthur Lunn, Albert Einstein, theory of relativity, many worlds theory, Hugh Everett, Mark Everett, Eels, museums, Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, Heisenberg, quadrivium

Allusionist 168 Debuts transcript

January 13, 2023 The Allusionist

HZ: The work that RFSU does has included, over the past three decades, coming up with new terms, to fill gaps in the vocabulary or provide more options for talking about sex and bodies.

KALLE ROCKLINGER: Sometimes it's to highlight or make something visible that's not been really talked about. Sometimes it's to change norms in society in some ways, and sometimes it's been sort of a really strategic choice for us in our political work to refuse a certain term or way of describing things, to tell another story, so to speak.

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In transcript, Telling Other Stories Tags words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, telling other stories, renaming, names, neologisms, Kalle Rocklinger, bodies, body parts, sex, sexuality, sex education, genitalia, genitals, Sweden, Swedish, RFSU, snippa, snopp, vulva, vagina, penis, virginity, sex debut, onanism, Onan, Anna Kosztovics, hymen, vaginal corona, slidkrans, masturbation, consent, rape, law, deflower, dittography, klittra, snipa, Telling Other Stories

Allusionist 167 Bonus 2022 transcript

December 16, 2022 The Allusionist

TIM CLARE: Hippocampus, meaning ‘horse’ because it looks like a a sea horse, right? …Oh, don't look at them! They look absolutely terrifying!
HZ: I I've never seen a hippocampus, so I don't know. 
TIM CLARE: There is a real David Cronenberg-like element to them.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, Stephanie Foo, Morenike Giwa Onaiwu, Tim Clare, Jing Tsu, Hannah McGregor, Jolenta Greenberg, Kristen Meinzer, Lewis Raven Wallace, Charlotte Lydia Riley, brain, mental heath, autism, ASD, neurodiverse, almonds, tonsils, Little Women, Louisa May Allcott, sentiment, sentimentality, British Empire, empire, revisionism, nostalgia, transcription, transcripts, therapy, psychology, Chinese, wordplay, protest, homophones, grass mud horse, censorship, Judy Singer, neurotypical, journalism, migrants, migration, bias, historians, Second World War, World War Two, books, novels, Jo March, What Katy Did, Susan Coolidge, Rebecca, hack, life hacks, computing, programming, allistic, amygdala, hippocampus, life hack, neuro- neurodiversity, washin, worry, bonus, bonus episode

Allusionist 166 Fiona part 2 transcript

December 5, 2022 The Allusionist

HARRY JOSIE GILES: I don't think that anyone should come away from this conversation not wanting to use the name Fiona. I think this is a beautiful and rich history. It might not be quite the history that you imagined, but I think it's a beautiful history.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, Harry Josie Giles, Moll Heaton-Callaway, Fiona, Fiona Macleod, William Sharp, Elizabeth Sharp, Wilfion, Willfion, Scotland, Scottish, Gaelic, Celtic Revival, Celtic, Celticism, Highlands, Lowlands, Flora, Ffion, Fionnuala, Finn, white, poetry, novels, letters, correspondence, handwriting, LGBTQIA+, pseudonyms, alter egos, trans, gender, gender fluidity, authors, publishing, writers, writing, colonisation, colonial, cultural appropriation, authenticity, James Macpherson, Tales of Ossian, translation, myths, Irish, names, boats, Sharon Krossa, Caledonian Antisyzygy, Wikipedia, hyperbaton

Allusionist 163 Rhino Borked Guy transcript

October 22, 2022 The Allusionist

"Better to elect a rhino than an ass.”

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, entertainment, eponyms, Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, rhinoceros, Cacareco, elections, politics, political, votes, voting, protest vote, power, democracy, zoos, Richard Nixon, Pigasus, Republicans, Democrats, mule, Canada, Rhinoceros Party, English history, Tudors, Jacobean, guy, Guy Fawkes, Gunpowder Plot, Reformation, Protestant, Catholic, Catholicism, Church of England, religion, England, Henry VIII, pope, divorce, Elizabeth I, James I, kings, queens, monarchy, parliament, Roman Mars, Helen Zaltzman, bonfire, Bonfire Night, fireworks, 5 November, Robert Catesby, oppression, names, treason, conspiracy, gunpowder, explosives, weapons, molotov cocktail, Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet Union, USSR, Russia, Finland, Supreme Court, USA, American history, Ronald Reagan, Robert Bork, Joe Biden, Ted Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Watergate, disinformation, propaganda, Roe v Wade, bork, borked, computers, DoggoLingo, civil rights, originalism, constitution, kype

Allusionist 162 Self-Help transcript

October 7, 2022 The Allusionist

JOLENTA GREENBERG: One of the main things a lot of these books like to do is remind you how bad you are at the beginning. Just like a pickup artist, there will be a chapter or two sort of negging you, or being like, “You know you're lazy about this.” A lot of books make you admit - some even make you write down all the areas like you're failing in or not putting 100% into, and so you literally will have a list sometimes of reasons why you suck. And then they're like, “And now I have the answers!” And it's like, “But you made me make up these problems in the first place.” So they like to dig you in a hole and then be like, “I can dig you out, too.”

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, entertainment, personal, emotion, emotional, books, f19th century, self-help, self-improvement, self-determination, self esteem, self, advice, By the Book, Kristen Meinzer, Jolenta Greenberg, Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Smiles, manifesting, manipulation, wellness, weight loss, dieting, diet industry, diet culture, fatphobia, sizeism, doctor, stoics, forgiveness, spitchcock, mental health, psychology

Allusionist 161 Sentiment transcript

September 23, 2022 The Allusionist

SANDHYA DIRKS: When we talk about empathy: the idea that you can get outside of yourself, that we can imagine someone else's experience is so audacious, because human beings are not that freaking imaginative. I mean, like a unicorn is just a horse with a horn! We did not go that far to get to our most magical creature. We just like grafted two things on top of each other.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, entertainment, stories, story, storytelling, audio, personal, emotion, emotional, feelings, empathy, empathetic, sympathy, sentiment, sentimentality, kindness, be kind, Julia Furlan, Sandhya Dirks, Hannah McGregor, novels, books, fiction, genre, journalism, 18th century, 19th century, imperative, immanent, complexity, audience, manipulation, Bible, parables, allegory, trauma, death, Queen Elizabeth II, the Queen, tropes, thoughtstoppers, meat, unicorns

Allusionist 160 Coward transcript

September 10, 2022 The Allusionist

TIM CLARE: Calling someone a coward historically has often been a social lever used by the state to shame them for not doing something the state wants them to do - often walk into machine gunfire. Which, to me, doesn't seem like an act of cowardice to not want to do that.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, society & culture, arts, literature, lexicon, vocabulary, etymology, history, entertainment, psychology, personality, mental health, Tim Clare, coward, cowardice, anxiety, anxious, fear, tail, lions, heraldry, angst, anger, military, WW1, First World War, executions, death, soldiers, Britain, shell shock, shame, PTSD, trauma, Napoleon III, India, Raj, seagulls, Proto-Indo-European, PIE, Ancient Greek, Latin, cows, dogs, traits, terrific, awesome, tremendous, Bible, angels, magic bullet, silver bullet, werewolves, medical, zauberkugel, Magneto, coda, cue, hangnail, queue, quinsy, quakebuttock, yips

Allusionist 156 Rainbow Washing transcript

June 10, 2022 The Allusionist

HZ: The British supermarket M&S made an LGBT sandwich, which is lettuce, guacamole bacon, and tomato.

MITRA KABOLI: That sounds good, actually. I would eat that.

HZ: They stopped at that point of the initialisms; they didn't go into the -QIA, which is supposed to be what, queso? What foodstuffs begin with an I?

MITRA KABOLI: Ummmm...

HZ: It gets difficult. I can see why they stopped.

MITRA KABOLI: ‘I’...

HZ: For the 'A' - they've got guacamole, so they used up the avocado already. Maybe apple? It's starting to get disgusting the further along the initialism you get.

MITRA KABOLI: There has to be a law where you must continue to make the sandwich, and as the acronym grows with letters, you must find something to put in there.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, entertainment, society & culture, arts, literature, etymology, lexicon, vocabulary, Helen Zaltzman, history, whitewashing, whitewash, greenwashing, pinkwashing, redwashing, purplewashing, rainbow-washing, Pride, Pride flag, rainbows, breast cancer, Mitra Kaboli, Sarah Schulman, LGBTQIA+, commerce, capitalism, corporate, CIA, sandwiches, beer, Stonewall, autotelic
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several bits of news! (nothing bad)
queer playlist
Allusionist 207: Randomly Selected Words from the Dictionary
Allusionist 207: Randomly Selected Words from the Dictionary
Allusionist 206. Bonus 2024
Allusionist 206. Bonus 2024
A Christmas Carollusionist
A Christmas Carollusionist
Allusionist 205. Lexicat, part 2: now with added Dog
Allusionist 205. Lexicat, part 2: now with added Dog
Festivelusionists
Allusionist 204. Lexicat, part 1
Allusionist 204. Lexicat, part 1
Allusionist 203. Flyting
Allusionist 203. Flyting
Allusionist 202: Singlish Singlish
Allusionist 202: Singlish Singlish
Allusionist 201: Singlish
Allusionist 201: Singlish
Tranquillusionist: Ex-Constellations
Tranquillusionist: Ex-Constellations
Allusionist 200: 200th episode celebratory quiz!
Allusionist 200: 200th episode celebratory quiz!
Allusionist 199: 199 ideas that I hadn't made into podcasts yet
Allusionist 199: 199 ideas that I hadn't made into podcasts yet
live tour of the UK!
live tour of the UK!
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The Allusionist by Helen Zaltzman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.